The LEGO Movie: Everything is Awesome

Holy crap you guys, The LEGO Movie is amazing. This was probably one of the movies I was most excited about this year, and I’d be very surprised if anything comes out that tops it for me. Seriously, Captain America 2 could be the best Marvel movie ever and I’m pretty sure my top movie would still go to The LEGO Movie. It’s that good.

It has everything. Top-notch writing, an excellent cast, and great pacing and action. On top of that, it’s one of the most visually pleasing animated movies in a long, long time. Even during parts where there wasn’t a joke (which was rare), I was just sitting there smiling because of how the movie looks.

I think this is going to make a bzillion dollars because I went to a 10pm screening and the audience was half adults and half kids. These kids were PUMPED to see this movie, but the adults were laughing harder. Chris Miller and Phil Lord are great at turning mediocre concepts into great comedy. There are some insanely funny jokes in this movie.

I love how the movie embraces the commercialism of LEGO and the fact that it’s a movie based on a toy, but it still has a ton of heart and encourages creativity. If you haven’t seen it yet, I’d highly recommend that you don’t read anything spoilery, because there is a really cool and original plot twist that you don’t want spoiled.

The Characters

Chris Pratt is awesome as Emmet, who’s kind of a dumb everyman citizen of Bricksburg. He goes with the flow and needs instructions for pretty much everything in his life. He meets Wyldstyle (Elizabeth Banks) and gets confused with the subject of a prophecy, and the adventure starts from there. Morgan Freeman plays a hilarious prophet/wizard character and has a lot of great lines. Will Arnett kind of steals the show as Batman though. He’s a total dick and there are a lot of really clever Batman jokes. Just wait until you hear the song he wrote for his girlfriend.

Liam Neeson is great as Good Cop/Bad Cop, as is Charlie Day as Benny the 80-something Space Guy. There’s really not a bad bit of casting in the whole movie. Alison Brie (Community, Mad Men) is pretty funny as Unikitty too. Oh, and look out for Green Lantern and Superman, the few small scenes they have are hilarious.

The Look

This movie would have sucked if they would have animated it like the video games or LEGO TV shows. For the movie, everything had to move like actual LEGO bricks, which means that characters can’t bend their arms or legs or even close their hands. Everything is made of bricks, from water to the sky and clouds. It’s great to look at. This movie could have been dull and it still would have been fun to watch just for the visuals.

There are some awesome bits where they pan out to a very distant exterior shot that are really funny. For example, in the middle of a huge battle with really cool, detailed ships flying around, they pan out and suddenly the ships are tiny, bulky models and the sound effects sound like they’re being made by kid playing with his toys. Stuff like this make it so you never quite know what they’re going to do next.

There are tons of nods to classic LEGO stuff too. You can tell the filmmakers really respect the toy. There are jokes about classic LEGO lines and also jokes about some of the more obscure licensed sets they’ve made. You’ll definitely be surprised how much they fit in this movie. There are even really subtle nods to the adult stop-motion community that has been around for a long time, which I’m sure is really cool for the people who have spent so much time making LEGO movies and putting them online.

I had this movie hyped up to an insane level in my head but it blew past all expectations I had. It’s really funny, the visuals are amazing, and it even has a really cool message. I can’t wait to see it again, and now it’s going to be really hard to resist buying all the amazing LEGO sets based on the movie.